It's now been 50 days since Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern last posted from her Twitter account @jacindaardern. It's a bizarre situation for a Prime Minister who's proven so popular on social media.

She, or someone working for, has obviously logged into the account since the election, as the account's biography has been updated to reflect her becoming Prime Minister.

In that same time Prime Minister Ardern has posted 28 times to her Facebook page and 18 times to her Instagram account.

It's not the first time her Twitter account has gone silent. There was a similar 33 day gap between 20 August and 22 September right in the middle of the election campaign, which only ended with an event done in conjunction with Twitter's politics arm to have Jacinda reply to questions put to her over the platform on Election Day Eve.

Not tweeting seems to be a very odd strategy. Twitter has a generally left leaning audience who are going to be sympathetic towards the content Jacinda could post. Likewise the numbers following her account have grown by more than 20,000 people in the weeks since the election.

While I've always argued that the bulk of a politicians social media focus should be on Facebook given that the audience there is more representative of New Zealand as a whole, Twitter can and should still play a role in your approach. Twitter is often described as being "where news breaks", and as a result, it counts among its users some of the most influential journalists, business and community leaders, bloggers, and commentators in the country. By ensuring you're posting frequently on Twitter, you're making sure your messaging gets in front of them before someone else's does.

Instead, Labour appears to be putting all their energy into the Labour Party Twitter account @nzlabour. That's not entirely a bad thing, but in my experience, people are far more inclined to follow, interact with, and share content coming from a personal account rather than a political party account. With more than 109,000 followers on the @jacindaardern account, the Prime Minister is missing out on a chance to seriously amplify the messaging of the Labour-led government.

As it stands, Labour's apparent strategy of not having Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern tweet at all seems like a massive wasted opportunity.

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